Page:Twenty years before the mast - Charles Erskine, 1896.djvu/148

 have done enough now to show that the exertions of Captain Wilkes, and the results of the expedition intrusted to him, have,  in every respect, been such as to entitle him to the highest mark  of distinction which it is in the power of this society to bestow.

The following lines from Coleridge’s poem, "The Ancient Mariner," describe the albatross searching for food:

"The ice was here, the ice was there, The ice was all around: It cracked and glowed, and roared and howled, Like noises in a swound.

THE ALBATROSS IN THE HOLLOW OF A WAVE.

"At length did cross an albatross: Through the fog it came; As if it had been a Christian soul, We hailed it in God’s name.